SEVENTY-THREE

 

 

In mid-October, Miles received a rumpled and grimy envelope at the police station. Marked personal and confidential for Sheriff Miles Scott, it bore no return address. But it was postmarked St. John's, in the British dominion of Newfoundland—a port city on a rugged, wild island jutting out into the Atlantic just east of the Canadian province of Quebec. Miles had a good idea of who it was from even before he opened it. When he did, he found tiny, poorly punctuated script filling both sides of a single sheet of paper.

Dear Sheriff Scott, it read. By now I am sure you know that Sean Brennan murdered any number of souls aboard the Lucky Lena. You also probably know that he used my boat to do his dirty work. I feel I got to tell you what happened. For starters you may know that my boat the Daisy had an old diesel engine that was slowly giving out and making it hard for me to make a living. I did not have money for a new one. One day Brennan comes to me and says maybe we could help each other out and says he has a spare Liberty L-12 and that if I helped him ferry some tools and equipment from Anacortes sometimes then he would install the engine in the Daisy free of charge. I could not believe my good luck. We set to work installing the engine. Once it was in he said we needed to take it on a few shakedown runs out to D'Arcy Island and back to make sure it was running cool and proper. We brought Rupert Hawkins along for help.

The first such day Brennan had me shut down and drift once we got out near D'Arcy saying he wants to see how fast the oil temperature drops. But the whole time we sat and drifted he watched the Lucky Lena anchored off D'Arcy through his binoculars. He was not really interested in the oil temperature gauge but I was getting a free engine so I kept my trap shut and did not say anything. It was the same the next day with Brennan watching the Lucky Lena for two hours while we supposedly waited for the engine oil to cool. On the third such day Brennan asks if I knew anything about the wreck of the Empress of Burma. I said everyone knows she went down in Haro Strait. I said that was all I know. He looked at my nautical charts for a while and then went back to watching the Lucky Lena through the binoculars.

All of a sudden he's excited. Says he wants me to take him over to the Lucky Lena to have a word with its captain Hans Jensen from Deer Harbor. I told him it was getting dark and that a storm was blowing in and that we should head for home. He gets pushy. Says it's important. I asked what's so important it can't wait until tomorrow. He says the Lucky Lena was carrying liquor and Russian gold from the wreck of the Empress of Burma. He says I would get a cut for helping him and would never have to worry about money again and nobody would find out it was us because we would wear masks. I said I did not want no part of stealing someone else's cargo. He said it was already stolen and there was nothing wrong with stealing from thieves. I sure could have used the money but I knew in my heart that it would be wrong.

I was thinking it through when I look up and see Brennan and Hawkins staring at me with crazy wolf eyes like they have maybe gone mad. Then I thought they might kill me if I did not do what they said. Afraid for what would become of my helpless daughter if they killed me I went along. Brennan told me to drive him around the back side of D'Arcy to come at the Lucky Lena from the west. We come up alongside her and secured our lines and Brennan and Hawkins jumped aboard. They didn't wear masks. I do not think they had any. I think they just told me we would wear masks to get me to go along.

I heard Brennan ask Hans Jensen where the gold was. Hans said he didn't know what Brennan was talking about. Then Brennan shot Hans's son Leif in the leg. Brennan kept asking where the gold was and the Jensens kept saying they did not know what he was talking about. They shouted back and forth louder and louder until all of a sudden Brennan up and shoots both Jensen men dead. I could not believe my eyes and I thought my heart would stop. The Jensens were good people and Brennan shot them down like they were just a couple of stray dogs. Then acting like nothing happened Brennan raised the Lucky Lena's anchor and he and Hawkins cut the line and chained the Jensen's bodies to the anchor and dropped them overboard. Then they both went below deck looking for gold I guess.

Just as soon as they went down the companionway I started to untie the line holding the Daisy to the Lucky Lena. Then I heard the sound of unholy screaming. I will never forget that sound. It was like hogs screaming. Or lambs. Or children. And then there was more gunshots. Each shot came a couple of seconds apart like somebody was taking careful aim between each one. I undid the line and shoved off and waited until I drifted too far for one of them to jump back aboard before I started my engines. Last I saw of the Lucky Lena was Hawkins on her stern heaving a small body overboard and Brennan dropping what looked like a liquor crate and aiming his gun at me. Thank God none of his shots hit home.

Amen, thought Miles, wondering how on earth Brennan and Hawkins got off the Lucky Lena and back to Friday Harbor after dark and with a storm rolling in. He'd probably never know. Mystified, he turned his attention back to Cooper's letter.

Fearing for my life I raced back to town and grabbed my daughter Milly and ran for it. I know I should have come to you instead. But as you and the whole town know Dr. Boren has declared Milly a certified idiot and lunatic. She cannot care for herself. Seeing as how her mother died of Spanish flu I could not risk going to jail or the gallows as an accomplice and leaving Milly to the care of the state or some church we don't hold with. She deserves better. I promise that if you do not come after me that she will have a proper Christian upbringing. You probably would not find me anyway. It is a big world. Also I am sure you have more important things to do than chase down an old fool like me. I do hope that Brennan and Hawkins face justice. I am sorry for being yellow. I hope those terrible men did not hurt anyone else. But a father's first responsibility is to his daughter.

God bless,

Angus Cooper

Having finished the letter, Miles sat back in his chair and thought for a moment. So Brennan and Hawkins had been after liquor and gold after all. Finding the girls aboard had been a surprise. Then Brennan, seeing the risk of leaving any witnesses alive, gunned them down in cold blood. Angus Cooper, who was by all accounts a decent man, had been duped and intimidated into helping hijack the Lucky Lena. All because he didn't have the money for a new boat engine, which meant that he was facing financial ruin.

Miles opened a drawer in his desk, took out a Ronson lighter he kept for the occasional cigar, then rotated Cooper's letter over its flame until most of it was on fire. He held a corner, repositioning his fingers more than once to avoid being burned, until barely a third of the paper remained. Then he tossed it into his metal wastebasket and watched as the last fragment turned to black ash.